


A Sort Of Friend

by Elderly_Worm



Series: DYKWEI Extras [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Bickering, Canon-typical swearing, Enemies to Friends, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Heaven is Terrible (Good Omens), Other, Pre-Relationship, Reference To The Flood, Referenced murder, The Flood (Abrahamic Religions), can be read as platonic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:06:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28446618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elderly_Worm/pseuds/Elderly_Worm
Summary: Crowley is trying to tempt Noah’s daughters-in-law to start a feud, and Aziraphale is trying to help them reconcile. When they all end up going fishing, however, things don’t quite go as anyone planned... except the children, who just want to fish.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: DYKWEI Extras [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1997071
Comments: 12
Kudos: 20





	A Sort Of Friend

**Author's Note:**

> This moment fits in with the events of my much longer work-in-progress, [_Do You Know What Eternity Is_](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25798744/chapters/62664223), and follows the Flood in 3004 BC. However, it can stand alone. 
> 
> The title is part of a quote from the book: “Aziraphale. The Enemy, of course. But an enemy for six thousand years now, which made him a sort of friend.”

_2951 BC. Rural Mesopotamia._

“But you’re right,” Crawly said with feeling. “It’s not fair that Emzara’s always doting on Na-eltama-uk when you’re the better person here.”

Adataneses, one of Noah’s daughters-in-law, pursed her lips. “I know, I just don’t want to—”

“Mum!”

Crawly bit back a groan and turned to see Tiras, one of Adataneses’s boys, run up to them over the field. He was young, as humans around here went. Noah and Emzara were bloody ancient, though, so most humans were young in comparison…

Tiras wrapped his arms around his mother’s waist and looked up at her. “We’re going fishing! Can you come?”

Adataneses glanced toward Crowley, then down at Tiras. “I don’t know that fishing—”

“Aunt Na-eltama-uk said we could! Please? Please? And Gran’s coming. And Uncle Shem. Please, mum?” 

She rested a hand on Tiras’s head, casting Crawly an apologetic look, before looking back at her son. “Na-eltama-uk said you could?”

“Yeah! It was my idea, but Meshech and Edna and Betenos and Phut and Aram and Naamah all want to, too. Please?”

She frowned. “I was just talking to Crawly…” 

“’S all right. I can come with.” He offered a mostly-fake smile. After all, just because an unpleasant family boating trip was the perfect venue for tempting didn’t mean he had to like it. 

“Yay!” Tiras grinned. “This is the best day ever! I’ll go tell Phut. She’s going to find Asir-fell and ask him, too.”

Blast. Aziraphale was just about the only thing that could make an already dismal-looking fishing trip worse. He wasn’t trying to smite Crawly right now—not until the humans had finished rebuilding from the Flood, anyway—but he was a right wet blanket at the best of times. All that talk about doing good and the Great Plan. As if Heaven actually ever tried to do good. Even though they’d both just seen all the humans murdered…

Still, he’d agreed, and it would be a brilliant opportunity to try to set Adataneses and Na-eltama-uk on each other.

Crawly managed to keep a mostly-cheery face until Tiras had run off. Then, he looked over at Adataneses and grimaced. “Sorry.”

“It’s all right. It’s good to see him excited about something, after so long…”

“But you wish Na-eltama-uk hadn’t said it was okay for your son to do something without consulting you,” Crawly suggested.

She gave him a rueful smile. “That just about sums it up.”

Crawly made a sympathetic noise. 

“It’s just…” Adataneses exhaled heavily. “She’s so entitled, you know? And Emzara just encourages her. I should be able to decide if my own son goes fishing!”

“Yeah. Not her job, walking around like she owns the place.”

“Exactly.” Adataneses sighed, then looked over the field toward the Buranuna river, which glittered in the sun. 

The kids were clustered at the river bank, but there were a few adults too. Crawly could see Aziraphale’s cream-colored clothing from where he stood. 

“We should go over,” Crawly said. He didn’t _want_ to, obviously, but Adataneses’s bitter expression was worth it. 

They trudged over the field to join the other humans, who were gathering around a squad of little boats. It was probably more boats than they needed, strictly, but the Flood had done a number on everyone. So the kids just… kept building boats.

At least the Angel didn’t look happy about it. He was holding a collection of nets over the hands of clamouring children, eyes darting frantically between them. Crawly snapped his fingers to tangle the nets—just for fun, mind, since tempting Aziraphale did no good—and was rewarded with a precisely targeted glare. 

Served him right, anyway, supporting Heaven. Sure, Hell was rotten, but at least they mostly tortured people after they’d already died. 

It took far too long to get everyone into the boats. Crawly didn’t pay much attention. He didn’t need to. Someone handed him a baby early on, which the humans seemed to take as a decent excuse not to do any other work. 

Which, it was, really. Unless one happened to be able to keep babies asleep with magic and the rhythm of a lullabye tapped out on their back. 

But in boats they were, at the end. Tiras and Phut insisted on both their mothers being in the boat with them, even though they seemed perfectly happy to put nets in the water with no parental input. Crawly couldn’t have planned it better himself—Adataneses kept glaring at Na-eltama-uk, who was pretending not to notice. And he got to hand the baby back to whoever gave it to him in the first place.

There was just one, minor problem: Aziraphale was in the boat, too. 

“Isn’t this nice?” The Angel said after a few minutes’ silence.

“It is,” Na-eltama-uk agreed.

Adataneses took an obvious deep breath, apparently trying to keep her temper in check.

Crawly raised an eyebrow at her. 

“It’s fine,” she said.

“What’s fine?” Na-eltama-uk asked.

“Everything!” Aziraphale interjected. “Everything’s absolutely lovely. Isn’t that right, Tiras?”

Tiras didn’t answer.

There was the soft pulse of a miracle, and the sounds of the water suddenly seemed muffled.

“Tiras?” Aziraphale’s voice was much clearer.

“Huh?” Tiras looked back.

If Aziraphale was going to play dirty, Crawly sure as Heaven would too. He folded his arms and snapped his fingers discreetly. The sound of the water was magnified, louder than it had been before even before Aziraphale muffled it.

Adateneses stiffened. “Can you see where that’s coming from?”

“Everywhere, I think,” said Crawly. Which was true. It just wasn’t the whole story.

On the other side of the boat, Aziraphale was trying to explain what he’d meant to Tiras, when the sound of the water got quieter again.

“That’s not—” Na-eltama-uk’s voice was disconcertingly loud, and her eyes went wide. “That’s not right,” she added in a whisper.

“What isn’t?” Aziraphale’s expression looked perfectly innocent. 

Crawly knew better. He snapped his fingers again, and a large gathering of birds burst from the rushes beside the river. They thronged through the sky—many more than should, strictly speaking, have been able to fit in the rushes. All the wing-flapping and bird noises made it quite impossible to hear.

Then, all of a sudden, they turned and dove back into the rushes.

“As I was saying,” said Aziraphale with a touch more derision than before, “this whole trip is absolutely lovely. A splendid way to build family bonds.”

Crawly snorted. “I hardly think sitting on a bit of wood in a river is going to ‘build family bonds.’”

“I think it was a great idea,” Na-eltama-uk said.

“Thank you,” said Aziraphale.

Crawly frowned. “Was this your idea?”

“It was my idea,” Tiras said.

“No, it was not my idea,” said Aziraphale. “I am, however, in favour of it, as I explained before.”

“Why’s it so quiet?” Adataneses asked. “It’s giving me the creeps.”

“Quiet?” Aziraphale chuckled. “What in the devil are you talking about?”

Honestly, the nerve on him. 

Crawly snapped his fingers, and the volume of the river went back to normal.

“That’s _really_ not right,” Adataneses said.

Aziraphale gave Crawly a pointed look and the river went quiet again.

“Just stop it already, Angel,” Crawly snapped.

“Do call me Aziraphale.”

“Stop it.”

“Stop what, exactly?”

Adataneses and Na-eltama-uk were both staring at them, looking deeply confused.

He had to reign it in. Crawly took a deep breath, and glared at Aziraphale. “You know bloody well what.”

“I haven’t the faintest.”

Crawly couldn’t be held responsible, really. Aziraphale was being a proper bastard, and if he kept going, the humans would work it all out. And that would ruin the whole thing for both of them.

So, naturally, Crawly reached across the boat and pushed him. 

Aziraphale made a comically offended gasp, and pushed him back, hard.

Crawly gave an undignified yelp and grabbed onto Aziraphale’s robes to avoid toppling into the water. For a split second, they were balanced, caught between Aziraphale’s mass and Crawly’s momentum. 

Then they fell over the side of the boat into the river.

Crawly watched the plume of bubbles as he sank, fingers still clenched in the front of Aziraphale’s robes. Then the Angel jerked free and made for the surface.

Right. Crawly probably ought to do that, too.

He kicked for the surface, head breaking the water twenty feet from the boat. “You—” He got a mouthful of river water and spat it out— “ _bastard_.”

“Language,” Aziraphale said, then glanced at the boat, which was floating away, before continuing. “Though I suppose I can’t expect better from a Demon.”

Crawly made a rude gesture at him. Served him right for being able to stay afloat that well.* Then he began swimming toward the bank.

(* The reason Aziraphale was able to stay afloat in this way was that he was not actually swimming. Aziraphale had yet to encounter the fact that humans had to put effort into it, and as such, just expected himself to stay afloat. So he did. Crawly, on the other hand, knew that swimming required effort and, as a result, was relying rather more on his actual ability. This was not to say that Crawly was relying exclusively on his ability to swim, because he still hadn’t realized that current would factor into such things, and was remaining rather more stationary than he would have otherwise.)

Crawly pulled himself up on the river bank with a groan and turned over to lay on his back. The worst bit was, he couldn’t miracle himself dry, or the humans would notice.

Aziraphale emerged after him, a few feet down the bank. “You look a sight,” he said tersely.

“Look in a mirror, Angel.”

“Aziraphale.”

“Eurgh.” He sat up and got to his feet. His clothes were all wet and icky. 

Aziraphale seemed to have similar concerns—he was running a hand over his clothes with a grimace. Although, hang on—

“Are you drying your clothes?” Crawly asked.

“What of it?”

“The humans’ll think it’s funny if you turn up back at the village completely dry after falling in the river.”

“Oh, bother.” Aziraphale looked down at himself. 

Crawly grinned. “You have to go back in, now.”

“I shan’t.” He made a sharp gesture, and the rest of the water fell to the ground. “I shall just have to take a turn around the area before I go back.”

“Oh. That’s smart, I guess.”

“How kind of you,” said Aziraphale dryly.

Crawly hissed at him, then miracled the water out of his own clothes too. No sense being miserable when the Adversary was going to do the comfortable thing. Denial was more Heaven’s purview.

Aziraphale eyed him warily. “I don’t suppose, if I walked away, you’d consider going in a different direction?”

That was technically Crawly’s plan, originally. But now that he’d mentioned it, annoying the Angel sounded like as good entertainment as any. “Nope.”

“I thought not.”

“You’ll appreciate it when it gets dark out,” said Crawly. “Unless you enjoy falling on your face.”

“That was once. You didn’t even see it.”

“Yeah, and you decided not to get the dust off after, so I knew. That’s on you.”

Aziraphale glared at him, then began walking.

Crawly followed. “So, why the fishing anyway?”

“It seemed a good idea at the time. And it would have been if you hadn’t come and messed it about.”

“I guess. That’s my job, though.”

Aziraphale humphed and kept walking. 

**Author's Note:**

> The Buranuna is the Sumerian name for the river now known as the Euphrates.


End file.
